Iran’s IRGC appoints new Quds Force deputy commander

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) appointed Brig. Gen. Mohammad Hejazi as the new Quds Force deputy commander on Monday, state media reported.

Born in 1956 in the city of Isfahan, Hejazi joined the IRGC in 1979. He headed the IRGC’s Basij militia for over 10 years and was the IRGC deputy commander in 2008.

Hejazi was also the commander of the IRGC’s Tharallah base in Tehran in 2009, which oversaw the suppression of protests in the city that followed Iran’s controversial presidential elections that year.

The Council of the European Union added Hejazi to its sanctions list in October 2011 for playing a “central role in the post-election crackdown.”

Hejazi “was the author of a letter sent to the Ministry of Health on 26 June 2009 forbidding the disclosure of documents or medical records of anyone injured or hospitalized during post-elections events, implying a cover up,” according to the Council.

In August 2019, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) revealed that Hejazi was the Quds Force’s man in Lebanon, and that he was involved in an Iranian-led project to manufacture precision-guided missiles for Lebanese Hezbollah.

Former head of the IRGC-Quds Force and prominent military commander General Qassem Soleimani was killed in a US airstrike at Baghdad’s international airport earlier this month.

Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei appointed Brig. Gen. Esmail Ghaani as the new commander of the Quds Force hours after Soleimani’s killing.